Santa Monica Pier Aquarium, Santa Monica

Heal the Bay’s Santa Monica Pier Aquarium is located beach level at the historic Santa Monica Pier and attracts more than 85,000 visitors annually, including 15,000 students visiting for school and group field trips. The center serves as an educational resource for the community and attracts a portion of the estimated 4 million annual visitors to the Santa Monica Pier.

Before you head to Santa Monica, plan trip itinerary details with our user-friendly Santa Monica driving holiday planner , to make sure you see all that Santa Monica has to offer, including Santa Monica Pier Aquarium.Source

It cost us $14.00 per day at their public parking, if we had done our home work on the pier itself is $3.00 per hour. We only stayed for about an hour. I thought the pier would be more besides the rid...
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By bill1241On May 28, 2018

Yes, its a great please to take the kids to. I recommend it. Easy access and just the right size for young kids attention spans.
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This is one great aquarium for such a low price. I came with my daughter and her friend and only paid $5!!! For such a tiny place, it packed a lot of fun things to do for both kids and grown ups. We showed up on time to feed the starfish which was super cool! Also the staff here was super friendly, open to questions, and very encouraging to participate in the activities. You're in and out in one hour tops! For $5, I feel like I got more bang for my buck than spending $30 at the aquarium of the pacific in Long Beach. Don't forget to say hi to those beautiful eels in the entrance!

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By Ashley SundquistOn July 23, 2018

What an incredible, unexpectedly cool place to visit. There are interactive exhibits where guests can touch starfish and sea anemones. This petite community aquarium is connected to an awesome local nonprofit called Heal the Bay that focuses on water conservation and sustainability.
Tara is a very informative, engaging interim director and I'm confident the next executive director will be just as awesome. Highly recommend coming with children!

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By Rubi HeartOn August 7, 2018

Very small aquarium, its cute though and they have 4 fish tanks you can touch sea creatures in so that was really cool. My kids loved touching sea stars and hermit crabs. This aquarium also has sea urchins, sea snails and slugs to touch, they have a shark tank but you can not touch those. All the tanks do smell though, I know they're sea creatures but its a gross smell and you can only wash your hands in the bathroom which has wet floors, slippery and gross.
In other fish tanks you can look at the lobsters, eels, fish, shark eggs and more. There is also a section with books and puppets but the puppets feel dirty and scratchy, I let my kids play with them but washed their hands after that too. Its still a nice little aquarium you just have to wash your hands after and its part of Heal the Bay so I like suporting them. Lol

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By Daniel GoodavishOn April 21, 2018

This aquarium is very very small. However if you have young kids, it is a must see! You only pay for adults and it's only $5 per adult. There are touch and feel tanks which the kids loved and a shark tank which our oldest didn't want to leave. Place also has areas for coloring and other kid activities for young ones. Would pay more for what we received so it was a great value!

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By Shannon HopkinsOn December 29, 2017

This place was great. I kept reading how people mentioned this place is over priced and I'm sorry but $5 dollars for an adult and children free was not bad at all. Especially when you're walking around a hot day with your kids on the pier it was nice to come here. My kids loved it and the staff was super friendly and nice. It's small but they have enough going on and they do story telling and puppet shows. I would definitely recommend it especially if you're with younger children.